This study investigated the relationship between mental state talk and theory of mind. From a correlational perspective, it examined how language competences linked to the use and understanding of mental state talk are related to the development of theory of mind in children attending primary school. The 120 participants (mean age 9 years and 8 months), equally distributed by gender, were divided into two groups of age (8 and 10 years old). They were tested with linguistic and cognitive measures in order to assess the following abilities: the understanding of mental state talk, the understanding of metacognitive and metalinguistic verbs, the metalinguistic abilities, the understanding of second order false beliefs, and the comprehension of emotion. As predicted, analyses showed significant correlations between children’s use and comprehension of mental state talk and their performances on theory-of-mind tasks. Moreover, significant differences emerged as a function of age: 10 years-old children outperformed younger participants in all the tasks. For the mental state lexicon, the frequency of terms did not increase with age, whereas differences were found in the typology of lexicon. Younger participants used more volition and moral terms and less positive emotional terms than older ones. Analyses as a function of gender revealed that girls produced longer texts than boys. No further gender differences were found.
Lessico psicologicoe teoria della mente:uno studio con bambinidi scuola primaria
ZANETTI, MARIA ASSUNTA
2010-01-01
Abstract
This study investigated the relationship between mental state talk and theory of mind. From a correlational perspective, it examined how language competences linked to the use and understanding of mental state talk are related to the development of theory of mind in children attending primary school. The 120 participants (mean age 9 years and 8 months), equally distributed by gender, were divided into two groups of age (8 and 10 years old). They were tested with linguistic and cognitive measures in order to assess the following abilities: the understanding of mental state talk, the understanding of metacognitive and metalinguistic verbs, the metalinguistic abilities, the understanding of second order false beliefs, and the comprehension of emotion. As predicted, analyses showed significant correlations between children’s use and comprehension of mental state talk and their performances on theory-of-mind tasks. Moreover, significant differences emerged as a function of age: 10 years-old children outperformed younger participants in all the tasks. For the mental state lexicon, the frequency of terms did not increase with age, whereas differences were found in the typology of lexicon. Younger participants used more volition and moral terms and less positive emotional terms than older ones. Analyses as a function of gender revealed that girls produced longer texts than boys. No further gender differences were found.I documenti in IRIS sono protetti da copyright e tutti i diritti sono riservati, salvo diversa indicazione.